Come back alive
by Fnorpan
Summary: My first attempt at writing my stories down. Did not like the ending of ME3 so I made my own one. Very few spoilers as this One-Shot mainly focuses on what happened after the explosion. Shepard and Vakarian finding their way back to each other.


Ok so I updated the story to make it more readable.I also took away some spelling-errors.

Thanks to Mei-chiri for reviews making this story better.

Come back alive

There he was, stranded on an alien planet with nothing but idiots surrounding him. Why was it that he was the only one willing to bet that Shepard had made it through the explosion of the Crucible and destruction of the Citadel? Every single one was immersed in planning Shepards second funeral and rebuilding instead of picking the atmosphere clean of places Shepard could be dying, all alone.

His subvocals were oscillation between whining out his sorrow and yearning for the only woman ever to capture his entire being, and growling out his anger and frustration at her supposed friends fickleness. It had been two days since the explosion and still he hadn't received and answer to his demands towards the thickheaded assholes in the Alliance.  
His furious pacing in front of Alliance headquarters, or what was left of it anyway, was interrupted by Vega coming out the make-believe entrance.

"You sure you want to go through with this?" he asked, a little uncertainty coloring his tone. Garrus just growled threateningly in annoyance and scowled at the young lieutenant. What kind of stupid question was that?

" _Spirits… give me strength not to rip someone limb from limb."_ he thought to himself while stalking inside to meet what was left of Alliance brass.

Everything hurt. Everywhere she could see and feel was black, cold and smelled of death. The only comfort was that since she hurt allover she was still alive, probably anyway. How long would she be alive for? Was there enough air? Was help even coming? Would she be forced to once again die of suffocation or burn up in atmospheric entrance?  
Her thoughts spun like an angry hive of praetorians. To stifle her buzzing thoughts she tried to move but regretted the decision instantly as the pain that already wracked her mutilated body, worsened to the edge of insanely unbearable. White spots started dancing in front of her eyes and she could feel the pulling of the black void which was unconsciousness. After several wet, ragged breaths, meant to calm her, she managed to mentally swat the dancing specks and push away from the void of nothingness. She needed to get her bearings, she needed to assess her situation, but for now all she could do was try to stay awake in the off chance that someone came looking for her.

Her thoughts started to wander again, back to the safety and warmth of the arms holding her through the night before her descent into hell.

" _Garrus… where are you?"_ she thought. Was he even alive? Last she saw him he was badly hurt and she had forced him to fly out of battle on the Normandy. He had looked so betrayed, so heartbroken, so utterly defeated and her heart broke all over again. Something warm slipped down her cheek. First one at a time then increasing in frequency until they freely flowed from her closed eyes, stinging her wounds and patches of raw skin where she was burned. When she could no longer keep the spasming sobs at bay she felt unconsciousness drag her under as the excruciating pain, accompanied with movement, blacked out everything else.

Garrus had been approved for borrowing a shuttle from the Alliance so he could search the wreckage of the Crucible and Citadel, under the condition that he was able to get two-man volunteer-team to join him.  
He didn't think it was going to be a problem getting two people to volunteer for the search but everyone he asked declined to the point he was ready to rip someone's head of.  
None of Shepards so called friends in the Alliance was getting permission to leave for the search and rescue. Tali was not only injured but also being swamped with tech-jobs, EDI was not functional along with every other synthetic after the blast, Samara had died in the last push, Liara had gone up in smoke the moment they landed on earth and the damned prothean was nowhere to be found either.  
Every minute he delayed Shepards chances of survival diminished and he was starting to go into primalmode at the stress and frustration of everyone's idiocy.

 _"_ _Is there NOONE willing to at least TRY? Was this all she was worth?"_ he though with an angry huff when he got turned down by a sad and pissed off Kaidan. The one person Garrus thought would happily stomp on Alliance regs and protocols after all the shit they'd put them all through.

"I'm sorry, my superiors says 'I am more needed here than traipsing through space looking for ghosts' " he said airquoting the last part for his sentence and mimicking Admiral Mikhailovich annoying voice. At least he had the decency of being pissed for his superiors lack of respect, towards the one person making winning the war even a possibility.

Garrus spun and started stalking away towards the shuttlefield, hands twitching, subvocals growling loudly and eyes burning with pure rage. Everyone who met him gave him a very wide berth and the primal turian was so engulfed in his own self that he didn't even notice the open shuttledoor and the lack of guards meant to keep anyone from stealing the shuttle.  
As he entered he registered movement to his right and he reeled on it. One clawed hand found fabric to grip while pressing a soft intruder up against the shuttlewall. His primal mind registered the squishiness enough not to slam the intruder to its death while the second clawed hand pressed hard against the neck of whoever dared cross his right now. He was going after Shepard, with or without help, and no one was going to stop him!

His growl was no longer just rumbling from his subvocals, it roared through his throat in full scale and the blue squishy thing in his grip whimpered something unintelligible at the same time as it put its hands on either side of Garrus' head.  
Images of green eyes and fiery hair flashed in his mind. A female human, she smiled at him and recognition dawned. HIS female!  
The pictures shifted to include a blue figure in the background while his female was looking over her injured cheek in the mirror. The blue figure smiled at the mirror, an asari, his mind finally relented and he remembered Liara.  
The same second his mind calmed from his primal rage he felt the picture fade and reality come back into focus. Instantly he dropped the blue squishy thing, also known as Liara and kneeled to her side as she slid to the ground coughing and wheezing.

"I'm so sorry Liara…" Garrus began but she waved him off.

"It's ok, I understand." she said weakly rubbing one hand over her sore throat. "Remind me never to piss you off though." she continued.

"It's just so fucking frustrating that these Spirits be damned Alliance idiots once again show that they know nothing of honor or respect!" he growled as his anger started seeping through his mind again.

"I know, I heard from both Kaidan and Vega." Liara said with and irritated huff as she proceeded to standing up. Garrus followed suit as he waited for Liara to straighten her clothes and dust herself.

"That's why I'm here." she continued looking at him with fierce determination.

"Well Hacket grounded me until I have two people as backup so…" Garrus started in a somber tone.

"Oh I brought back-up." she said smirking.

"He's tying up the guards that foolishly tried to stop us from entering the shuttlefield".

Just as Liara finished her sentence Javik poked his arrogant head in the shuttle and nodded stiffly at Garrus before moving towards his mate. His eyes went wide before narrowing to slits as he zoomed in on the pinprick cuts and extensive bruising on Liaras throat. He spun to face Garrus in milliseconds, arms spread to the sides, shielding protectively in front of his mate. Growling low, crouching slightly, ready to pounce and focusing his four, now blazing amber eyes on the turian who backed up and hung his head in shame.  
A blue hand appeared on the angry protheans shoulder, his head snapped around to look at his love. She shook her head with a gentle smile.

"It wasn't his fault." Liara said while snaking her arms around Javiks waist and putting her forehead on his shoulderblade. While he relaxed his stance and stopped his growling, the words and gestures did nothing to calm the silent fury in the protheans eyes as he continued to pin Garrus with his gaze. A few moments past where nobody moved until Liara finally had enough.

"We're going to find Shepard, you boys behave or so help me goddess, I'll throw you out an airlock! BOTH of you!" she exclaimed while stepping in between them with a scowl. Javik averted his eyes slowly and moved, mumbling something about an "infuriating woman", to sit down and stare at the floor. Garrus looked equal parts apologetic and thankful at Liara before moving up to the driver-seat to get the shuttle in the air.

 _"_ _Please Spirits, let her still be alive!"_ he thought desperately while the shuttle rose up in to the atmosphere towards the wreckage of the once proud Citadel.

When she opened her eyes everything was still black, or at least dark. Death was all around her, the smell of rotting flesh making her painfully empty stomach reel and clench violently. She managed to subdue the dry heaving and blink away the tears of pain as her body moved involuntarily. She was feeling both too hot and too cold and she was contemplating trying to move to get a look at her surroundings and assessing herself. She decided against it for the time being.  
As she looked around her current position she found herself stuck under a big slab of metal and rubble. Her head was propped up on something hard and cool behind her. To be able to get an idea of what her situation was and what she could expect if she moved out of her hidey-hole, she started going over the last moments after hitting the beam in here head. Trying to freeze and replay everything in detail like Liara had taught here when they were trying to get a handle on the prothean visions.

She remembered the annoying AI posing as a child, spouting nonsense and being a general dickhead with a side-dish of asshole. The AI went to great pains to make it sound like a best option was to force evolution. To force every being in the universe to convert to half organic, half synthetic.  
It was acting and sounding like it was all-knowing and damn if it didn't still piss her off to think about the little prick. She hadn't really paid attention to the AI after it started spouting nonsense at her to get her to do what it could not. Instead she had pointedly ignored it and turned to the choice of destruction. Firing every bullet her weapon still held at the console. When that didn't work she gathered her remaining strength to pummel the console with biotics blasts till it blew up sending her flying backwards. Or was it downwards? She couldn't tell.  
A memory of hitting her head on something came to the forefront as well as the world around her turning the shade of red. Shepard looked around some more and decided to try and roll over the rubble incasing her and out from under the metal slab.

 _"_ _This is going to hurt like hell and then some…"_ she thought before gritting her teeth and moving her battered body. Half way around and almost over the little pile of rubble cradling her, she could hear herself screaming at the top of her lungs in agony.  
No sooner had she reached the top as she rolled over and slipped downwards. The slope of rubble wasn't steep or long, but enough so that the impact that jostled her sore body took her breath away and threatened to send her deep into unconsciousness again. Somehow, through sheer willpower, stubbornness and determination she managed to stay awake. Her eyes was shut tight and her breaths was small, ragged and quick for the time it took her to force herself back into a waking state. She broke out in a cold sweat and she could taste bile at the back of her throat after the effort. Seconds ticked by into minutes and after what seemed like an eternity her breathing slowed, the pain subsided a tiny bit and she could slowly open her eyes.

 _"_ _FUCK!"_ she thought _"Let's not try that again anytime soon…"  
_ Her endeavor, however, did pay off as she could clearly see she had ended up on what remained of the elevator going between the Crucible and the Citadels inner chamber, with her head at the elevators control panel. Or what was left of it anyway. Shepard could now only see one problem, though to be fair it was a huge problem in her current condition.

 _"_ _How in the blue hell will anyone find me in the center of a wrecked Citadel…"_ she mused in despair. Before the war and before going through the beam no one had even known about the central chamber, much less known how to get there.

 _"_ _Garrus…"_ was the last thought in her mind before exhaustion overcame her again making her unaware of the single tear that found its way down her cheek where she lay on her side in the rubble and ash of the broken space station.

Even though the air was still breathable they chose to keep their helmets or breathing masks on to escape the smell of rotting flesh. Liara, Garrus and Javik had been walking around the ruins of the Citadel for hours trying to find Shepard or any inkling of information as to her whereabouts or health. All they had found so far was dead civilians, reaper-troops and Cerberus-husks.

They were in the middle of searching rubble near the central column of the station when they discovered what looked like a dead keeper outside a shaft leading into the bowels of the station. They peeked inside and tried their luck following the tunnel but doubled back after it split into too many directions. Without a proper map or guidance system they could get lost in there and never find their way out.  
Frustration was building rapidly in the team and they were all on edge. No one spoke as they trudged on, searching every inch of the Citadel as they passed.

She had no idea how many days, hours or minutes she had been trapped helpless and alone on the wrecked space-station. She didn't know if the station was still in space, where in space or if it had crashed to a planet. She only knew that she had to move, lest she be stuck dying of either infection, thirst or hunger.  
Sitting up was not possible so standing or walking was a laughable notion. She had to settle for half crawling and half dragging her ass across the floor. She had decided to go back to the area where she first came through the beam.

 _"_ _There must be a way to get out of this fucking room."_ she thought as she was slowly and painfully inching her way towards her goal. Pauses came frequently as pain or exhaustion threatened to through her into the void and while her body was resting she inspected every inch of the room as she passed it. Memorizing the layout and alternative routes if the one chosen would not bear fruit.

"SHH!" Garrus hissed at his teammates as he was certain he had heard something. Both Liara and Javik froze and readied themselves for battle. The helmet was impairing his hearing so against his wishes Garrus took it off.  
The smell of death and decay assaulted his nose and made him dryheave until the sound of a scream froze him midheave. Javik's eyes snapped around looking for the source of the noise he also had heard this time. Liara looked at Javik but it was obvious she hadn't heard anything. They all moved in crouched unison, nerves on edge, ready to pounce at the first sign of trouble. It was eerily quiet, like the calm before a nasty storm, as they moved forward and silently searched every nook and cranny, every pile of rubble and turned every dead body. They found nothing and slowly they started relaxing again.

As they reached what was left of the presidium they took a moment to rest themselves. They had rations with them but the smell kept them from even thinking of eating. Garrus went to pry open the elevator shaft when he once again froze solid. His mind went into overdrive as his senses honed in on a very faint scent. Through the shaft he could faintly smell her blood, Shepards blood!

 _Jane…"_ he thought as he stood speechless, closing his eyes and drew in a deep breath in spite of the foul odor of rotting flesh and filth. It was her, no doubt in his mind. He would know that smell anywhere!  
His eyes flew open and his subvocals started making a desperate sound of half whine and half growl as he fought to get the elevator doors open. Javik and Liara did not question, did not try to talk, reason or get in his way. They helped him get the doors open and watched him disappear down the shaft in seconds. Garrus no longer knew they existed, and both of them knew better than trying to stand between a turian and his mate. Especially this turian who was sleep deprived and prone to violence after days under heavy stress, anxiety and shame. Javik and Liara climbed carefully down after Garrus tracking him with Javik's sensory ability.

Shepard saw stars and blackness dance in front of her eyes, she couldn't even curse, or move or do anything other than try to get air into her lungs. Almost at the end of the tunnels she had arrived at when entering the beam, the floor had given way and she had fallen headlong down to the next floor. Her vision swam when she opened her eyes and she squeezed them shut in a hurry. Everything hurt so bad she almost wished she would just die already. Dying in the atmosphere of Alchera was nothing compared to this. At least she had been unconscious from lack of oxygen for the burning up and painful part.

As she slowly gained control of herself and her battered senses again she wasn't sure if moving again was an option. Contemplating her situation left her with little to no choice though and she made a grueling attempt to roll over to her stomach again. The shrill scream her throat produced was horrifying. And once she found herself on her stomach again with her cheek pressed against the cold steel, she discovered she was bleeding profusely from somewhere. If the bloodstain on the floor was anything to go by. There was however no more energy to muster, her consciousness was quickly leaving her and all she could think about was the last moments of betrayal and despair in Garrus' face.

 _"_ _Garrus… forgive me… I will not be able to keep my promise… I tried… I'm sorry…"_ was her last thoughts before the void enveloped her for what she was certain was the last time.

"NO!" he snarled viciously as he slammed the door in the general's face. Hacket could go fuck himself. No one was allowed in Shepard's room except him and those he knew were close to her, until he was sure she was out of the woods and could speak for herself. He would not let her out of his sights! Ever again!

The audacity of the Alliance was pissing him of royally, making his subvocals flare into aggravated growling and he had to relieve stress by pacing so he would not tear down the walls. Now when she was undoubtedly alive they all of a sudden tried to claim her again. Without shame they showed up every other day to try and pry her out of his arms and care and limit his access to her. Garrus was having none of it!  
Luckily the Alliance was smart enough to learn from their mistakes of sending Admiral Mikhailovich that one time when Hacket had other matters to attend to. Garrus had almost ripped the Admiral limb from limb when he started arguing that Shepard belonged to the Alliance and Garrus, as a turian, had no right to interfere with Alliance-protocol to take over the care and supervision of the Commander.

"She is my MATE and I will be DEAD before you ever lay your greedy hands on her ever again!" he had roared at the admiral while shoving the man out of the room and in to the wall on the opposite end of the hallway outside. Before he could pounce on the Admiral however, Liara had showed up with Javik in tow, as usual, and while Liara managed to subdue the furious turian, Javik had proceeded to "take out the trash" as he called it.

There had been a pathetic attempt from the Alliance to arrest and prosecute Garrus due to Admiral Mikhailovich incessant complaints of bodily harm and whatnot. General Hacket, however had put a stop to the farce, reprimanded the admiral and apologized for the unfortunate event as he called it.

Hacket knew more than most about the secret bonding of the turian and the Commander. He knew that the bonding, even though not sanctioned by any spiritual advisor or family, still signified more than what marriage did to humans. And thus Admiral Mikhailovich had not only overstepped his bounds by his bold statements, he also risked provoking violent reactions from not only the entire turian species, but all species who now saw Shepard as one of their own.

Shepard had in her dealings with the people of the galaxy, not only become an honorary krogan due to adopting one tankbread menace of a krogan and curing the genophage, she had become an honorary turian after saving the Primarchs son, twice, saved the face of the entire turian species, bonded to one of their top hierarchal people and broker peace between turians and krogans. Not to mention that she ended the war between the quarians and the Geth, getting them to work as a team to rebuild Rannoch and thus added the title honorary quarian to her resume.

Garrus went back to his chair by Jane's bed after calming himself after the latest visitation attempt of General Hacket. He took her hand in both his and placed his forehead to her hand, closing his eyes and tried to wish her to wake up.

She could hear him shouting, growling and pacing. That voice, those subvocals, she would know them anywhere. A heavy slam shook the room and she felt herself jerk involuntarily, he must not have noticed in his anger. Her eyes refused to open but she could hear him and to her indescribable joy she could feel him as he took her hand. Relief, joy, yearning, love, desire and a pang of guilt warred inside her for control.  
She could feel his breath on her hand and then hard plates. The intimate familiarity with the pressing of foreheads made her soul smile as she realized he must have put his to her hand, not wanting to risk hurting her by pressing against her sore head.

Sore. Not only was she gaining her senses back but also the nauseating, gut-wrenching pain. The perpetual beeping of the heartmonitor started to pick up its pace and she could hear herself whimper. It was a small, broken sound laced with the panic she felt as the pain descended on her like a pack of rabid Varren.

Garrus head snapped up at the increasing speed of the heartmonitors beeping, he could feel her waking up and he was praising every god, spirit and deity he could remember. His heart was bursting with longing, love and anticipation and he had almost stopped breathing.

She stirred slightly and made a sound, a whimper, so small, panicked and broken he felt his heart sink to the bottom of the ocean.  
Never in their entire time knowing each other had he heard her make such a fragile sound. He had heard her scream and whine in more ways than one, with all the injuries they had healed together all the pleasure and sorrow they had shared. But not even when she mourned their beloved friends deaths and had broken down crying in his arms had she made even close to the heartbreaking sound as she now produced.

He slammed the button for help which hung near the headboard of the hospital bed and started a subvocal cooing unconsciously to soothe his mate. He wanted nothing more than for her to wake up, but now he was scared. Had lost her to the pain and grief of the war? Was her injuries to bad that she would never recover and would have to live in pain for the rest of her life? Did she wish she was dead?

"Spirits Jane, please, please be ok…" he mumbled as the door to the room flew open. The doctor made short work of some tests noninvasive tests before reassuring him that although the Commander was in pain it should be bearable with the medication she was getting through IV. She needed to wake up for them to assess her headinjuries. But they did not believe she would wake up for at least a couple of days yet.

Her wounds was surprisingly few and looked far worse than they were with the advanced medical treatments available. Cuts, bruises and burns over a majority of her front side after taking a hit from the reaperbeam, a couple of cracked ribs, a broken leg and a dislocated shoulder. The hole in her abdomen from a small pipe she had when he had found her was the most life-threatening one with all the bleeding but since Liara and Javik had been able to close most of it with medi-gel before departing from the hell formerly known as the Citadel, it posed no problem at the hospital.  
Infection had set in but Jane responded well to antibiotics so the only injury left to worry about was her head. She had a brutal gash across her right temple and down her cheek and most of her right side was black and blue, also there was a wound in the back of her head, probably from falling down to where Garrus found her. That pointed to at the very least a very nasty concussion and since she was a biotic with an implant there was always a higher risk of headtrauma causing problems.

The panic subsided ever so slightly as the painlevel never spiked to nauseating nor soulwracking. Her voice had quieted and with the panic draining out of her system she started to pick up bits and pieces of sound again.

"…needs to wake up before we know how extensive her headinjuries are." said a deep and raspy voice of a man, followed by a womans thin and nasal voice.

"Call us when she wakes up."

So she was in the hospital, she should have known due to the lack of smell of decay. But the last time she started coming out of unconsciousness they had still been on the Citadel. She had woken up as she heard a pleading whine and felt a familiar warmth envelop her. He was kneeling and had her pulled tight but gently in his arms while someone she could not see was spreading something over her back. She had managed to look at him, smile and tell him she loved him before the pain made her scream and her mind retreated into oblivion.

She smiled as she heard murmurs of her mate beside her and she noted his breath hitch in his throat.

"Jane?" his voice was shaky and sounded terrified. She instinctively wanted to hurt anything making her mate feel such terror and insecurity. Then her dazed mind caught up with the notion that it was probably her injuries that had him scared and that hurting herself to protect him probably was a bad idea all things considered.

"Amatra… please…" _(Beloved... please...)_ came Garrus voice again. Not as shaky but instead, breathless.  
Jane focused all her willpower to do one thing. Opening her damned eyes! Her lids felt as if they were filled with led but she managed to get them to at least flutter a couple of times. She could hear Garrus hold his breath and feel his hands tighten around hers.

 _"_ _Come on you piece of shit body! WORK!"_ she screamed internally, focusing once more on getting those unwilling eyes to cooperate.  
Her eyes fluttered slightly and she managed to get them to stay open, though half lidded. Her sight swam for a while before she blinked the world she never thought she'd see again, into focus.  
There he was, her beautiful turian. His eyes was fixed on hers, filled with emotions and conflict. To coax a reaction from him she tried squeezing his hand a little, it was not much but he reacted by snapping his eyes to their joined hands and then back up to her eyes.

"Jane!" he choked out, subvocals going crazy with mixed emotions. Her impaired brain managed to pick out happiness and insecurity, or was it relief? Maybe both she argued with herself.  
Garrus lifted one hand and carefully placed it on her cheek as if he was afraid she'll either break or disappear. She leaned in to his touch and managed a small smile. It was no more than a slight quirk on the edge of her lips but it lit up her eyes in a way that melted Garrus' fears in seconds.  
She was alive, she was still his Jane, his Amatra. He dropped his head in his hands letting out a deep sigh before looking up at her reverently, lifting her hand to his own cheek and nuzzling in.

"You came back…" he said vibrating with happiness, pride and love.

"A… ad..adamare t..talau" _(I love you)_ she whispered with a broken voice.

* * *

Amatra – Beloved (female)

Adamare talau – I love you (adamare – I love, talau – you spoken from female to male in intimate relations)


End file.
